Thursday, October 23, 2014

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

The Death Valley Ride is a little deal loosely organized by our pal, Troy. It's really nothing more than a bunch of friends putting down 666 miles through Southern California's/Nevadas beautiful desert. No flyers, no sponsors, no bad attitudes... I think some people may have gotten the wrong idea and assumed the DVR is sort of an "elitist" thing because there is no formal Instagram mass-invite but the truth to the matter is if you know, you'll know....if you wanna know, just ask. I think this method works best to weed out the bullshitters and people that probably don't belong here anyways.

I blew it the first year, then got a metal sliver in my eye the day before last year so i made sure to play it safe the couple weeks leading up to the ride. Luke, Chase and myself rode up to Adam and Tony's the night before for a little chopper slumber party and to cut a majority of that horrible downtown LA traffic in half. The next morning when we pulled up to the meeting spot, I knew right away this was going to be an awesome weekend. Nothing but familiar faces, choppers and most of all, smiles.

There's a reason people come to California, and it's to experience how awesome and diverse the landscape is. Some of the best riding can be done right here, and my first visit to Death Valley was no exception and besides a few hiccups (Nicks, Eddies and my bike calling it quits) everybody made it pretty much unscathed to Las Vegas. Some dudes went hard, some didn't but the one thing we all did was have fun...together.

I know I've had some rough times as of late and for the first time in my life, I'm trying to set my sights on and enjoy the good shit going on around me rather than focus on the bad shit and let it eat me alive. This weekend was a great reminder of how rad things can be when people step up and watch out for one another rather than themselves.

My phone was dead the whole time but fortunately for you, Ben had his camera and caught some rad photos.

Thursday, October 2, 2014

Met Andy at Chopper Bash and the dude is amped on life, super funny and just a great dude. If my memory serves me correctly he told this bike was built back in the day and had been sitting for awhile. He picked it up and with some elbow grease he got it back on the road and couldn't be prouder of it. Andy and his wife Anna throw The Trip Out chopper show in the UK every year. I am hoping we can make it out there some day.

Saturday, September 20, 2014

I met Ivan at the Chopper Bash in the Netherlands this past summer. To the best of my knowledge he inherited his love for bikes from his dad who had built several bikes back in the day. He built this panhead with some help from dudes like Mattias from LeBeef and Brandon a Mullin's Chain Drive. He almost had a perfect panhead until he put a set of our Andy Pegs on there. He ended up winning Best In Show that weekend. Cool bike from a even cooler dude.

Monday, September 15, 2014

Had a great time riding around the hills of central California this weekend. When I talk to people about vacations they go on, there full of activities. They never stop moving, and I wonder how they cram so much stuff Into one day. Sure that can be fun and all but when I think of a vacation I think of actual relaxation. The absence of everything and a whole lot of doing nothing. For my girlfriends birthday we had a little post b day vacation and we camped out by a lake and did a whole lot of nothing and we loved every minute of it.